BMW says that its range of upcoming and current electrified vehicles embody the brand’s dynamic focus, and that it will not sacrifice these characteristics in search of faster acceleration for the sake of numbers.

Speaking to Australian motoring media at the Frankfurt motor show, Klaus Fröhlich, member of the board of management at BMW, said that all electric vehicles from the German brand have to provide the same emotional appeal a BMW powered by an internal combustion engine.

“Electro mobility has to be as emotional [as ICE], has to give you the kick. You know it from our petrol engine history - and future. By the way, we will have M cars for a very, very long time and they will be quite exciting, I can tell you. Now, with this energy density, we now have cars that behave like a BMW,” Fröhlich said.

Using the recently unveiled BMW i Vision dynamic concept as an example (above and below), Fröhlich says that it delivers similar performance credentials to today’s M cars.

Asked why the car’s 0-100km/h time of around four seconds is not up to the standards of other manufacturers such as Tesla’s Model S (with which it will compete), which is now capable of breaking into the two-second mark, Fröhlich said it’s a weight compromise that BMW isn’t willing to make.

“You have to be careful - because then you have a good sticker, 2.8 seconds or whatever - but then you have a monster because you have one tonne of battery in your car and it doesn’t steer, [or] how it behaves in cornering – I am very careful to not put too much big batteries in the cars because it spoils the driving fun.”

Whilst the BMW i sub brand will continue to overarch the German manufacturer’s efforts into electric mobility - with BMW confirming there will be at least one electrified vehicle coming per year for the foreseeable future - BMW’s M cars are also looking at forms of electrification.